[only now reviewing this thread...] Stephane Bortzmeyer <bortzmeyer@xxxxxx> writes: > On Tue, May 21, 2013 at 10:26:39AM +1000, > Mark Andrews <marka@xxxxxxx> wrote > a message of 52 lines which said: > > I'm not sure what the solution should be but regular audits of > > delegated nameservers by infrastructure operator and removal of > > delegations after a grace period > Let's not reinvent the wheel: I suggest to first study the experience > of the TLD which did exactly that. .fr had mandatory technical tests > of the name servers almost from its inception, until december > 2012. The tool used for the tests was Zonecheck > <http://www.zonecheck.fr/> > Although these tests certainly contributed to the good technical > quality of the name servers, they were removed both for commercial > reasons (a registry has to make money to pay its employees) and > because it was easier to have the same rules for ccTLDs and gTLDs (and > ICANN forbids these technical tests in gTLDs). First I've heard that "ICANN forbids these technical tests in gTLDs", and I doubt it's true. Just exactly what tests are you referring to? It would also help if you could point to the actual policies or contract language in the registry or registrar contracts that speak to these restrictions you refer to. Thomas